Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of an ocean recovery strategy to tackle plastic pollution.

The UK is committed to protecting the marine environment from all human-induced stressors. The UK Marine Strategy sets out how we will take action at a national and international level to achieve or maintain Good Environmental Status in UK seas, including by reducing marine litter.

In addition, the Resources and Waste Strategy for England, published in December 2018, sets out our plans to eliminate all avoidable plastic waste, working towards our 25 Year Environment Plan target to reduce all types of marine plastic pollution.

As a Contracting Party to the OSPAR Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic, the UK develops and implements actions under the OSPAR Regional Action Plan for Marine Litter and participates in monitoring programmes to assess regional trends in marine litter.

As the issue of marine plastic litter cannot be solved by one country alone the UK has announced support to start negotiations on a new global agreement to coordinate global action on marine litter and microplastics.